thou hast _not_ done? Ask, why is it that thou wert not long ago
destroyed? Why wert thou not drowned in Yarmouth Roads; killed in the
fight when the ship was taken by the Sallee man-of-war; devoured by the
wild beasts on the coast of Africa; or drowned _here_, when all the crew
perished but thyself? Dost _thou_ ask, what have I done?" I was struck
dumb with these reflections, as one astonished, and had not a word to
say--no, not to answer to myself, but rose up pensive and sad, walked
back to my retreat, and went up over my wall, as if I had been going to
bed; but my thoughts were sadly disturbed, and I had no inclination to
sleep; so I sat down in my chair, and lighted my lamp, for it began to be
dark. Now, as the apprehension of the return of my distemper terrified
me very much, it occurred to my thought that the Brazilians take no
physic but their tobacco for almost all distempers, and I had a piece of
a roll of tobacco in one of the chests, which was quite cured, and some
also that was green, and not quite cured.

I went, directed by Heaven no doubt; for in this chest I found a cure
both for soul and body. I opened the chest, and found what I looked for,
the tobacco; and as the few books I had saved lay there too, I took out
one of the Bibles which I mentioned before, and which to this time I had
not found leisure or inclination to look into. I say, I took it out, and
brought both that and the tobacco with me to the table. What use to make
of the tobacco I knew not, in my distemper, or whether it was good for it
or no: but I tried several experiments with it, as if I was resolved it
should hit one way or other. I first took a piece of leaf, and chewed it
in my mouth, which, indeed, at first almost stupefied my brain, the
tobacco being green and strong, and that I had not been much used to.
Then I took some and steeped it an hour or two in some rum, and resolved
to take a dose of it when I lay down; and lastly, I burnt some upon a pan
of coals, and held my nose close over the smoke of it as long as I could
bear it, as well for the heat as almost for suffocation. In the interval
of this operation I took up the Bible and began to read; but my head was
too much disturbed with the tobacco to bear reading, at least at that
time; only, having opened the book casually, the first words that
occurred to me were these, "Call on Me in the day of trouble, and I will
deliver thee, and thou shalt glorify Me." These words